


The Tune Changed

by Dracones



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Divergence - Order 66, Canon Divergence - Revenge of the Sith, Gen, Hope you enjoy, I mean I've only done RotS so far, RotS to ANH timeline, but if I get decent feedback I'll probably continue, hopefully, idek, so I might just forget I even wrote this, stop reading the tags now nerd, story time!, struggling to write 7yo leia so far tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-02 22:10:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10228586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dracones/pseuds/Dracones
Summary: All it would take to change the course of Galactic history is for one more Jedi to react slightly faster, evade their pursuers, and survive Order 66.How that history changes depends on which Jedi. In this case, Darth Sidious begins to doubt that he was his master's first apprentice, the Empire's war against the Seperatists does not stop, and there is no closure for Obi-Wan on Mustafar, only pain.





	

Above a dry desert planet, set against the empty reaches of space, the Republic fleet fired rapidly on the oncoming squadron of vulture droids launched from the Seperatist base on the planet's surface. It was a common scene of siege, the type that had been replicated a thousand times across the galaxy since the Clone War had begun, requiring no new tactical analysis whatsoever, and yet Jedi Knight Vyri Tel felt an unusual disturbance in the Force. It was not a major switch in the pattern, not the beginning of a building crescendo of violence, but an off note, a sudden change of key in the Force's constant melody of which she herself was just a small part.

She brushed it off, for a second, just another point of conflict elsewhere in the Galaxy that had changed its path. But then, a minute later, there was another note of disarray, another disturbance, and the melody changed it's key, and pace, gradually becoming more disturbing and wrong than she had ever heard it before, and then it grew louder suddenly, as if it had changed its focus to her.

She took a breath and summoned the force to her control, trying to sense the source. The origin was clouded, hidden deep within the core, but she could feel its influence behind her, amongst the clone troopers that were coming up to join her on the walkway of the cruiser's bridge. She turned, her head rising, and it was only due to the fact that the Force was already at her fingertips that Vyri was able to react in time to the fact that her men were, to both her flanks, levelling their blasters at her face.

Her hands shot outwards, splayed to both sides, before the commander directly in front of her had raised his weapon too, and eight clones went flying away from her even as she redirected her attention.

Another, more directed Force Push, broke the commander's neck even before his men had hit the ground. She made a snap decision, then, between fight and flight, and closed all three doors to the bridge using the Force before drawing and igniting her orange-bladed lightsaber as the clones began to get up and the technicians on the level below began to look up. She went right first, spinning past the first clone before grabbing him in a headlock and slicing her blade through two of his companions, even as the first shots from the other group of four hit the man she was using as a shield. The remaining trooper on her side made a quick shot which she deflected back into him, and he dropped.

Vyri spun. Her lightsaber bisected the clone next to her and as he fell, in pieces, she cast another Force push to those on the other side of the walkway before charging after it, making quick work of them.

Unfortunately, the bridge wasn't empty, and so when she turned the entire command centre was staring at her, aghast.

One of them slowly raised a short-range comm device to his mouth, and Vyri quickly summoned it to her hand using the Force.

"No outside communication for now, please," she told the room in general. "They pulled their guns on me. I don't know why but I'd like to find out, and if you give me the chance to do so before casting judgement it would be much appreciated. Understood?"

There were no complaints.

Vyri moved over to the commander's corpse, checking the comm on his wrist. There had been a recent hologram from an unknown frequency and Vyri couldn't return the call. So much for that idea. Plain old brainpower would have to do the trick.

Well, she knew that the disturbance in the Force had originated in the core, so the cause was unlikely to be a Seperatist deception - unless it was at the very highest level of government. And even then, why attack the Jedi rather than try to sabotage the battle or work out troop movements and give them an advantage in the war? The Force likely wouldn't have obscured her from seeing the cause unless another Force user had been deliberately masking it. But since Count Dooku's death the Seperatists had no known Force users on their side...

So it wasn't a Seperatist plot, it likely was from high-up in the senate, particularly if it had convinced the ever-loyal clones to turn traitor, it wanted to kill Jedi, and it involved a Force user. Definitely the Dark Side, possibly, even probably, in fact almost definitely given the potential scale off the plot and the targeting of Jedi -

Vyri dropped the comm.

The battle raging outside the bridge seemed almost trivial when the Sith were in complete control of a clone army of millions of elite troops.

She seemed almost useless when all over the galaxy the Force was singing of despair and the deaths of those who cared for it most.

The Galaxy seemed more terrifying than it had ever been before, when two opposing armies about whom revolved its fate were determined to see the death of her and all those like her.

Vyri took a breath and released her fear. It took a few more seconds to compose herself, but she did so, before turning back to the rest of the bridge, who looked on apprehensively.

Her voice was darker when she spoke. "As we speak, the Jedi are being executed across the Galaxy by clone troopers they believed they could trust. I don't know why. I don't know what you'll be told about it. But I know that I need to leave. This battle is yours now, I need to get to the bottom of this." With that, she opened the doors again, and strode straight for the nearest one, heading for the hangar where her starfighter resided.

She encountered no resistance along the way, though she was forced to mind-trick a clone or two, and set a course to the middle of absolutely nowhere, to plan what she could for her next move. Solitude often helped her think, and she had had precious little of it, of late.

* * *

In the middle of a  vast expanse of space, a gulf in the centre of three Outer-Rim systems with little interest in galactic travel, Vyri began to see the galaxy for the stars, and the scale of the plot that had led to the war. She could, however, deduce no accurate details, nor make out a plan of attack. After a day of meditation and thought, she decided to make for the nearest inhabited sysyem and seek information from the holonews channels.

And so she plugged in the co-ordinates for Mustafar, and her tiny starfighter shot off into the darkness of space.

* * *

The Force sang to her of grief, a fall, and opportunity when she entered orbit around the planet, but mostly the latter, and she suspected she was sensing melodies meant for others. Though they were worrying, she could not resist the Force's pull herself, and made the descent to atmosphere level towards a small outpost to the side of a magma river. Mustafar was a boiling hot planet, and yet the Force compelled Vyri to pull up her hood after she had landed. She did so, wondering of the significance, before moving towards the compound's entrance.

"Welcome, Lord Vader. We've been expecting you," came the voice of a Neimoidian who Vyri recognised as Nute Gunray, Viceroy of the Trade Federation and Seperatist leader.

She took a deep breath and composed herself, preparing for duplicity and staring around the room, which turned out to contain the entire Seperatist leadership but for General Grievous. "You were informed of my arrival?" she asked, in as low a voice as she could, waving her hand vaugely to reinforce the notion that she was a man through the force. She'd never been so grateful for her lack of significantly-sized breasts.

Gunray nodded in confirmation. "Lord Sidious informed us that you would be taking control here, my Lord, though we did not expect you so soon."

"The Sith have their ways, Gunray," Vyri told him, heart in her mouth.

"Of course," he replied, and she allowed herself a quick smirk. So it _was_ the Sith.

"There will be a change in command here. I command the droids now, as I command all of you. Any who wish to dispute that will regret it." She allowed her hooded gaze to pass over the room, and saw not a hint of disagreement. "You can contact Sidious from this outpost?"

The Viceroy nodded again.

"Do so immediately. I want a secure call, alone."

* * *

Once all other life forms had exited the holoroom and Vyri was sure it was clear of recording devices, she activated the equipment. A short while later, a hologram of a hooded and robed man appeared in front of her. She narrowed her eyes.

"Darth Sidious," she began, in her normal tone of voice. "I hear you have a new apprentice."

"Who is this?" a voice, faintly recognisable, though Vyri could not discern where she knew it from, rasped from beneath the cloak. "What have you done with my apprentice?"

"To the galaxy, I shall be Darth Vader, head of the Seperatist armies and destroyer of the Republic. You may know me as Darth Cor." Vyri had chosen the alias 'Cor' for an undercover mission half a decade back, and saw little harm in its resurrection.

"You are no Sith," Sidious told her, his breathing harsh. "The Rule of Two would not allow-"

"The Sith care not for rules, Sidious, or are you no Sith yourself? Did you think yourself to be your Master's first apprentice?" Whisperings of legend and guesswork were what Vyri pinned her hopes on now, but they failed her not, for the image before her had no reply to give.

She could only continue, else she would lose the momentum and the confrontation would go his way. "The Jedi are no threat to you now, mark my words. _I_ am what you should fear." She ignited her orange lightsaber, letting its blade fall by her side. "Your war is over. It's my war we fight now." With that, she shut down the hologram, and the plasma blade of her lightsaber vanished.

Vyri Tel breathed again.

* * *

When a hooded figure disembarked from a Republic starfighter like hers - which she had long since concealed within a hangar - she was prepared, and met it on a thin walkway above a long fall.

"Is this Darth Vader?" she asked, stepping out from behind a rock formation at the end when the figure was halfway across.

The figure stretched a hand out, grasping, and she felt a crushing pressure on her throat through the Force which she couldn't shield or ignore even from over thirty feet away.

What she could do was flick the switch on the explosives she'd had the Seperatists set up, and feel the pressure on her neck abate as the figure was flung skywards, a terrible scream torn from its throat.

It hit the ground, aflame and almost broken, on a gravel slope below Vyri, and she decided to check whether she needed to finish the job.

It's fortunate that she does, for somehow the figure's blue lightsaber is still functional, and he has regained consciousness once she arrives on the scene, though he clearly cannot walk. She calls the weapon to her, only for him to resort to choking her again. A light Force Push is all she requires to persuade him to abandon that notion.

"You will find yourself immersed in lava if you displease me, you realise," Vyri begins, as the hour is far too late for peaceful negotiations. "I advise you to answer my questions. Who is Darth Sidious?"

"My Master will make you-" The Sith spluttered to a halt once Vyri activated her lightsaber, but still failed to reconsider. "I'll tell you nothing!"

"Do you care not for your own life?" Vyri queried. The Sith had long been known for selfishness.

That gave him pause. The pathetic figure at the edge of the magma river was silent, eyes and a face that Vyri more and more began to recognise staring up at her for what seemed like an eternity; until she stepped forwards menacingly and he began to beg her to let him live. She knelt in front of him, within the reach of her lightsabers but not his arms, and spoke.

"Tell me who your master is, and how he killed off the Jedi, and who you are, and you may be spared, Vader. If not, you die."

He told her everything, and she thanked him before she stabbed her orange plasma beam through Skywalker's treacherous, youngling-killing head.

* * *

When she reemerged at the top of the gravel slope, she caught sight of a chrome silver starship making a landing, and changed her path to intercept it, on the whim of a whisper of the Force. When she reached the landing platform, it became clearer that this was not a threatening approach - the beings who had disembarked were unarmed, and had they been armed to the teeth Vyri would not have considerd a protocol droid and a heavily pregnant senator to be a threat.

"Senator Amidala, this is not Republic territory. I suggest you return to Coruscant or Naboo, you are not safe here, particularly given your current state," Vyri told her, watching the Senator's face radiate bewilderment and fear.

"Who are you?" Amidala questioned, fumbling for a blaster by her side before realising it was absent.

Vyri removed her hood. "No-one you need fear. I am a Jedi Knight."

"Do you know where Anakin is?"

Vyri was silent for a second. "He confessed to me that he had joined the Sith, that the killing of Jedi and younglings across the galaxy was in part through his actions, and that he himself had burned the temple to the ground. Of his own choice, he then fell, toppled into the lava before my eyes." She did not mention that it was not his choice to topple, or to fall to her blade, but his previous choices had led to those events, and so she could justify the misdirection in her mind. "I am sorry, Senator, but the man you loved is dead." And Vyri was sorry indeed - that anyone had the misfortune to love such a man.

The woman burst into tears, fell to the ground with her head in her hands, as another figure made their way out of the starship; one she recognised, and had briefly met before.

"Master Kenobi," Vyri said, bowing. Amidala did not pause in her tears.

"Knight Vyri," he responded, moving slowly around the weeping figure, "It is a relief to see you alive."

"Likewise."

"Anakin, I must know," he began, with a significant gaze at her, "He is dead?"

Vyri's lightsaber hilt slid into her hand, and with a quick glance at the Senator, she pressed the emittor against her chin. "Definitely." She brought her other hand up then, and returned her lightsaber to her belt as she pressed the remains of Skywalker's into his mentor's chest.

He took it, gently. "What do you plan now?" Kenobi asked as he stepped back, looking to the figure curled on the floor of the landing pad.

"I have convinced the Seperatists that I am the Sith that Sidious - Palpatine - promised would lead them. I shall turn their armies against him, and save as many Jedi as I can in the process. I shall attempt to have him assassinated. I shall use any means I can to save the Galaxy."

For a few moments, the Force's tune grew optimistic, hopeful in the face of loss, and then it started to sing of an ominous presence fast approaching from above. Kenobi and Vyri glanced skywards simultaneously, before looking to each other, and to the Senator's ship.

"Come with us!" Kenobi told her, but she shook her head.

"The Seperatists have left Mustafar but my ship remains. I told him I'm a Sith, the world will think I'm a Sith, but if I leave my ship here he'll be able to work out who I am really and the deception I'm planning won't work. You go, I follow, then we talk more. Co-ordinates?"

They agreed quickly on a location, a nondescript landing platform on Alderaan, before Vyri sprinted for the hangar.

She blasted her way out of the atmosphere at lightspeed just as Sidious's ship entered it.

* * *

"How did you escape?"

"With the help of a rebreather and the blessing of the Force. I stole a ship and ran for it. I ended up in Coruscant in time to see some of the aftermath..." Kenobi's breaths quickened and his eyes glazed, until he came to, slowing his breathing, and blinking heavily, until he could look her in the eye again. "The younglings, he... I trained a padawan who was capable of such horror. What does that say about me?"

The answer came naturally to Vyri. "He was capable of great evil and of great good. He was never destined to be a normal Jedi. Good and bad resided in him, fighting for control. The balance of the Force tipped to the Dark side first in him, and now in the Galaxy. Its fate was tied to his. There is no way anyone could have known how finely poised the balance was, how dire the potential consequences of any mistake would be. We all have a balance in us, Kenobi, and none around us can truly know on which side of the scales their actions place a weight, for we are the ones who control the scales. You lean to the light. Your intentions were good, I am convinced of it. There is nothing more you could have done."

Obi-Wan's eyes were lowered. The Force sang of his grief; it was that which she had sensed before Mustafar. "He was my brother," came the voice of a broken man. "I loved him."

* * *

"I should return to the Seperatists," Vyri commented. "The Sith can surely track them easily, and I need to work out how to mount a proper -offensive against this new "Empire" of theirs."

"Feel out of place you do, hmm?"

Vyri glanced up at the ancient Jedi Grandmaster across the table and shrugged. "I'm not the type of person who gets invited to discussions that could decide the fate of the galaxy."

"Decide the fate of the galaxy, we WILL. Help, you will. Survived you did where others did not; plans for you the Force has. Remain, Knight Vyri."

She acquiesced graciously to Yoda's opinion even as he continued to speak. "Ended this war, Sidious has not. Into hiding we Jedi will not go. Train, we must, Master Kenobi and I. Train both ourselves and others. Strong with the Force, the younglings birthed by Senator Amidala are."

"You cannot think to take them as apprentices now," Bail Organa interjected. "They are newborns!"

"Raised by the Jedi from childhood, Master Obi-Wan was. Harmed him, it has not, hmm?"

"But to be taken in so young?" Bail pressed. "Should they not have a more normal childhood, at least in part? I cannot condone moulding children into weapons."

"A childhood away from the Jedi, their father had. Raised by the Jedi I was. Security and wisdom we can give them, and guidance. But train them to fight, when prepared they are, we must. Only with Jedi to destroy the Sith can peace be restored."

"Are you not Jedi? Can you not fight?"

"Attempt to kill Sidious, I did. Defeated I was."

"And you expect a pair of children born earlier today to do better?" Organa was incredulous. "There are three Jedi here now! Together you could beat him!"

"Or we could all die." Vyri cut in. "Before he died, Skywalker mentioned that Sidious had killed three Jedi Masters and Mace Windu himself when they came to arrest him. One Grand Master, one Master, and a Knight could well pose little trouble for him. Those of us who can need time to get better, and more numbers couldn't hurt."

"If Master Yoda deems it necessary, I trust his judgement," Obi-Wan cut in. Organa nodded reluctantly in response. "But I must ask, how do you plan to train them? There are only three of us left."

A twinkle appeared in Yoda's eyes, then, and Vyri felt a surge of sudden worry, not in the Force, but in her gut.

_He can't just-_

"Delegate, I shall," said the small green alien, and even as Obi-Wan nodded along Vyri had never felt a stronger urge than she did at that moment; an overwhelming desire to wrap her hands around his scrawny little neck.

"I'm not experienced enough to train a Padawan," she stated, as calmly as she could.

"Other Jedi Knights, Padawans have taken," he replied.

"Not as young as me."

"Some younger have been. And not all become knights as young as you, hmm?"

"There have been very few younger Padawans than fresh from the womb. You are asking me to become a mother and fight a war at the same time."

"A problem with fighting a war you have?"

"No."

"A problem with children, you have?"

Vyri paused. "Children and I don't get on, and raising one is a full-time occupation. I cannot lead a war and do so simultaneously."

Yoda nodded. "Fair, your concerns are. Elsewhere, a child shall be raised, until old enough for training it is. Obi-Wan, the other shall raise, while we plan our resistance against this new Empire."

"Very well," Obi-Wan said. "I should like the chance to redeem my failings in Anakin's training. May I teach his son?"

"From you, much he shall learn," Yoda agreed. "And from you will she," he told Vyri.

Vyri slowly nodded, accepting the idea. "She should be seven," she said. "When I start to train her."

Yoda considered Vyri, gravely, and his voice was harsh when he spoke. "Seven, you were, when come to the Temple you did, and seven your apprentice shall be. Leia, her name is. Train her well you shall."

"One can only hope," Vyri deadpanned. "Or the Galaxy's going to be even more fucked up by the time this is done."

* * *

"We will not end this war," Vyri stated, "Until we win."

"Lord Vader... is there no prospect of peace to be had?"

Nute Gunray had been told that there would be a peace settlement by Palpatine, an important piece of information and leverage to have, but had nowhere near enough intelligence to know what to do with it. Setting himself up as an opponent of the new commander in a public forum such as a council was a perfect precondition to being used as an example. The only question in Vyri's mind, rather than whether to overrule Gunray or to concede the point and open the floor to debate, was whether publically cowing the unintelligent opponents with a demonstration of power against him would have better results than disposing of him for good behind closed doors and letting the more intelligent council members get the message.

She chose to postpone the takedown. "While your concerns are appreciated, this is not a discussion about ending the war. The sanctions this new empire would impose on the systems and companies that support us would be utterly extortionate, the harm done to the business federations that finance us would be immense, and the subjugation of the systems in the confederacy would be unmanageable. The confederacy would lose not just the war, Gunray, but all we are. Peace is not an option; we must take a new route in war."

Gunray bowed his head. Vyri glanced about the Seperatist Council's table, noting that the reactions to her statement were mixed. While some seemed almost mutinous, no dissent was spoken, and there was an air of general agreement in the room, which, for now, would do.

"With our most recent defeats, it has become obvious that we are not on an even footing with the Empire in terms of military might, and that our former victories were largely due to the military abilities of our former commanders, Dooku and Grievous. Though the Jedi who fought them are also largely dead now, we no longer posess that advantage; hence my decision to cease hostilities against the Jedi order; such figureheads will inspire propaganda and loyalty if we can convince those that survived the betrayal to our side. However, this is one prospect for the future, and if it fails other plans must come forwards. Are there any major developments underway that you believe could swing the tide of the war?"

A cacophony of voices arose, indistinguishable from one another, and Vyri shortly ran out of patience.

Her lightsaber sprang to her hand and the blade sprang through the throat of the nearest councillor as she burst to her feet, chair rattling behind her. "I will be perfectly happy to keep killing councillors until you all shut the kriff up; whether it's every last one of you or just one remains to be seen. Trust me on this, silence would be well advised."

And there was silence. Vyri flicked her lightsaber off and didn't even bother to watch as Poggle the Lesser collapsed to the tabletop.

* * *

"It has become obvious over the course of the war that you council members are not to be trusted to make vital military decisions, and yet you consistently put yourselves in situations where such decisions need to be made by you. As such, all military power shall henceforth be delegated to a number of sentient commanders, to be selected through loyalty, intelligence, and ingenuity tests, reporting directly to myself."

* * *

"This project under construction - the "death star" - is far too obviously a space station. A single obvious depression while the remainder is near-perfectly spherical, the fact that it is entirely monochrome, and the constantly present defending fleet, such as would never be present for a true moon of that size. It must be camoflaged, kept secret from all but at most two sentients outside this room; the principle designer and the commander in charge of the building clones and their defending garrison."

"But Lord Vader, other builders and commanders are already aware of the project!"

"Have them killed and replaced, Commander. Replace the builders with droids, and the commanders with their subordinates. Oh, and while you're at it, rename the damned thing. It's never going to have a good reputation as it is."

* * *

"The Empire's forces are gathering in strength. The victories we have achieved in the past few years will no longer be possible for us. This war must change to a defensive one until we can move the Victory Moon into position such that the Empreror is within the full destruction range. In the meantime, we shall allow them token victories where we can afford them and fight hard where we cannot."

* * *

"Lord Vader! There's a shuttle from Alderaan entering the atmosphere, they say they have a message for you!"

For the first time in years, Vyri Tel was terrified.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed it!
> 
> I wrote this ages ago, but haven't made any progress into actual storyline since. Thought I'd edit it up a bit and post it, see if inspiration hit me. I mean, it's got to sometime, right?
> 
> Right?


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